Reviewed by Vicki
TITLE: Shadowboxing
SERIES: Arbor Heights #9
AUTHOR: Diana DeRicci
PUBLISHER: MLR Press
LENGTH: 176 pages
BLURB:
Wayne Hightower has lived with a secret since he was a teenager. Debilitating to relationships, his condition stands in the way of his father’s ultimate expectation: Finding a woman to marry. Of course, if he could do that, he’d have the grandchildren his mother was craving. And everyone would be happy happy happy. Or so he’d been raised to believe. If he could find her. If he could get over his problem.
Ditched by his brother for their planned night of sibling bonding, Erich Villalobos invites Wayne out instead as a simple act of friendship. One night that throws Wayne into an environment he’d never been exposed to and revealing a playfully animated side of Wayne Erich had never imagined. One that he quickly learns he’s actually attracted to.
Secrets. Everyone has them. Wayne. Erich. Even Wayne’s parents. If Wayne’s brother Curtis were still alive, he could tell Wayne the cause of his condition and how to cure it. But dead men don’t talk.
REVIEW:
Ahhh… a nice friends to lovers story, just what I needed! Wayne and Erich work together, and aren’t exactly friends, co-workers, and are friendly, but as the story starts they aren’t really that close. But one evening after work, Erich asks Wayne out for a drink. Erich can see that Wayne has had a hard afternoon, overhearing him being dumped by his latest girlfriend. Erich senses Wayne needs an evening out, and out they go. To a gay bar, Wayne is surprised to see, never having been in one before! He’s ok with Erich being gay, he’s just never really thought about it much.
The two men go out, and Wayne gets his drink on! And let’s his hair down, telling Erich his secret, then passing out on his couch. They begin to form a friendship, after that first evening, Erich continuing it by asking city boy Wayne if he want’s to go camping. The two of them grow closer, and Erich has some feelings developing for the sexy straight Wayne… But Wayne may not be quite as straight as he thinks! Both men have some issues in their background, Wayne with his “personal issue”, a dead brother, and a whole lot of pressure to marry coming from his parents. Erich has some stalkerish ex-boyfriends, and a bit of a seedy work history. All of this is gradually revealed in this story.
I guess I can say what one of Wayne’s issues is, since this is a gay romance novel, it’s probably not a big spoiler to say that he is gay! I enjoyed reading his revelation of his sexuality, his exploration you could say. He has a fantastic teacher in the form of a very sexy Erich. I like stories like this one, as a man has his eyes and heart opened, and realizes who he is inside. I will say that Wayne was just a little whiny for me, and seems pretty damn clueless about the possibility he might be gay. He even mentions he’s seen a counselor, I’d think at some point it might have come up. But whatever, it worked as a story for me! There was something I found disturbing though, there is a confrontation scene, involving someone else, but Erich was short with Wayne right before this scene occurred. During this scene, Wayne punches Erich in the stomach. That moment really threw me out of the story, it totally didn’t fit and I do not understand at all why he would do that. So wrong for his character, wrong for the scene, and it’s hardly even addressed later. Other than that moment I liked all of this book very much!
I’ve read a bunch of Diana’s books, although only one other in this series, and I generally like them. Every once in a while her writing gets a little sappy, maybe a phrase or a comment a character utters, or the sex scenes get a little flowery, but that’s all really ok. I might pause over something now and then, but I really do like her books. Her characters are all well written, especially Erich and Wayne, with their dramatic pasts. This book is part of a series, but I think only because they are set in the same town, there were no other characters mentioned in this book, and I don’t feel like I missed anything, not having read most of the others. It was a good stand-alone novel.
So overall I liked it! Wayne was a little whiny now and then, Erich nice and strong to balance that our. Good background drama for them, a little bit of action, some nice first time sex, and a happy ending.
RATING: 
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